


Five People The Mechanisms Have Met Who Have Tried to Live Forever (And One Who Might Have Succeeded)

by ImAGiraffacorn



Series: Mechtober 2020 [8]
Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Gen, Humor, Immortality, Light Angst, Mechtober, Swearing, mechtober2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:46:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27332890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImAGiraffacorn/pseuds/ImAGiraffacorn
Summary: The Mechanisms have met many beings over the years who actively want to be immortal, so they decide to... honor? remember? publicly ridicule? them.
Relationships: The Mechanisms Ensemble & The Mechanisms Ensemble
Series: Mechtober 2020 [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1988512
Comments: 4
Kudos: 47





	Five People The Mechanisms Have Met Who Have Tried to Live Forever (And One Who Might Have Succeeded)

**Author's Note:**

> Totally frying my brain a bit right now, but I’m also in the zone, so I’m gonna keep writing until I keel over! Wish me luck!

The Mechanisms had met many beings over the years who craved immortality, and yet in all their travels, they had never actually met anyone else who succeeded. At some point in their travels, they had started collecting the records of failed immortality. What had originally been a pet project of Ivy’s, a small section of her library with a few handwritten notes, had twisted and turned and eventually become the official Traveling Museum of Idiots Trying to Live Forever, the largest collection of information on those who tried to not die. It was entirely non-profit and tax-exempt, and somehow maintained an entry fee of exactly nothing.

* * *

One of the oldest exhibits was that of King Cole, back when it was just Jonny and Tim and Brian and Ivy and Ashes and Nastya and the Toy Soldier and the Toy Soldier in a slightly different timeline. He’d made it a little over two thousand years before they first ran into him, through various measures of science and sorcery.

Unfortunately, he had had his still-beating heart viciously ripped out of his chest before he could get much farther. Still, two millenia was not shabby, especially for such an awful ruler. Even hundreds of years later, there were still drunken discussions among those who had fought in the rebellion, wondering how it had taken more than two thousand goddamn years before someone finally decided to overthrow the bastard.

* * *

Another early exhibit contained the only surviving records of Labyrinth anywhere in the universe. Those records, however, were lacking much substance beyond recounting the tale of how Ashes O’Reilly, quartermaster and professional arsonist crime boss god, had taken over the Acheron. While there were many tales that had circulated the City pertaining to Hades’s rather sudden appearance, their actual entrance had been rather quick and anticlimactic. At least, by their standards.

The Thanatos family had learned the hard way that what they had was not even close to true immortality. There’s only so much that can be done to prolong one’s life when Ashes takes it as a personal challenge to burn their houses, businesses, spouses, children, parents, friends, enemies, people who owed them money, people they owed money, and them to the ground in as little time as possible. 

To the dying days of the planet, there was not a single record left of the original guardians of the Acheron.

* * *

The most colorful exhibit was Odin’s.

The All-Mother’s human lifespan was not particularly notable among the others on display, especially considering the average Asgardian lifespan was already in the mid one hundreds. However, given the extent of the destruction caused by Odin’s mad quest, a significant amount of energy had been put into her section. The amount of glitter glue used on the train tracks alone was probably enough to build a new Bifrost.

Also, as best as the Mechanisms could tell, she was probably still alive. The last record of her on the Black Box did technically involve her falling into a supernova, but eldritch gods had a tendency to mess with what counts as dying. Given that Yog-Sothoth had come through the Bifrost eventually, it was entirely within reason to believe that it had decided to keep her alive in some state, whether as punishment or a gift.

* * *

The follow up to the Thanatos exhibit had been hastily constructed by Jonny and Raphaella, and detailed how the rest of the Olympians died because of a significantly smaller fire. 

The oldest of the Olympians - Zeus, Poseidon, Hestia, and Demeter - were nearly five thousand years old a piece by the time the Acheron fell, which put them very high on the “how long can a regular mortal live” list. Of course, the entire crew considered the lot of them to be the height of idiocy and assholishness, so the exhibit ended up tucked away in a back corner.

It also had a tendency to combust at random, and upon almost burning down two other exhibits early in the museum’s history, Ivy had moved it far from the rest of her carefully-curated displays.

* * *

A small exhibit off to the side was notable only for the giant neon sign above it, loudly announcing the number 35. As it happens, the subject of the exhibit had only lived for thirty five years, about fifty years shy of his species average.

Dr. Pilchard had earned his spot through the sheer audacity of his attempt at immortality. In all their travels, the Mechanisms could name three people who had ever successfully taken them all out at once. One of them, a pissed-off aristocrat with a stunning ability to conceal daggers on his person, had only been at it for the fun of revenge. Another, whose name was never said allowed and the mere mention of her existence tended to incur at least one rage-fueled murder, had done so on multiple occasions for any number of reasons.

And then there was Dr. Pilchard, who had one by one taken out the entire crew without ever resorting to murder. If he hadn’t died bloodily due to an understandable apprehension at trusting one of his prisoners, there was a decent chance he might have actually succeeded.

* * *

The last exhibit when you left the museum was easily the most interesting. It was by far the most professionally set up, and had a clashing mixture of well-preserved scientific notes that were entirely illegible, large cardboard signs with nothing but spray-painted obscenities, old polaroids of blurry people that appeared to have been taken on the lost planet of Malone, and an old walking cane. 

There was no name attached to the display, the placards explaining the items were almost entirely redacted, and if asked, none of the Mechanisms would explain it. Ivy would sometimes say it had earned it’s place of honor from how long it’s subject had lived, but she wouldn’t give a number. 

Without fail, it was cleaned and taken care of, the glass cases sparkling in the low light of the museum.

**Author's Note:**

> I am very tired and may or may not have had a really fun halloween night, so please let me know if there’s any grammar/spelling issues! And I know this is technically post-October, but I’m going to finish all of these!!!! It’ll just take me a bit!!!


End file.
